On April 15 2023, tensions between warring factions in Sudan’s military leadership erupted into full-blown military conflict. In a few short weeks, Sudan has seen the death and injury of hundreds, witnessed gender and ethnic violence against civilian populations, and experienced refugee waves on a mass scale. As a humanitarian crisis unfolds, public institutions too, including essential healthcare facilities, are under threat.

A cessation of hostilities, global humanitarian action, and political stabilisation must be paramount goals. But cultural heritage too is vital in sustaining shared values, preserving cultural memory, and building peace. Since the overthrow of dictatorship in Sudan in 2019, cultural heritage, arts and creative institutions and movements have fed the re-emergence of a democratic civil society. King’s College colleagues have offered support in the form of two projects co-funded since 2023 by the KCL Global Cultures Institute. The Sudan Memory digital archiving project has collaborated since 2013 with partners including the Sudanese Association for Archiving Knowledge (SUDAAK) to conserve and promote cultural materials from official, community and private archives across and beyond Sudan

The Hussein Shariffe audiovisual heritage project has worked meanwhile with partners including the Sudan Film Factory and the Arsenal Institute for Film and Video Art, Berlin, to restore to international visibility the films, art and poetry of exile Sudanese artist-filmmaker and pro-democracy public intellectual Hussein Shariffe.

On 30 May, partners from Sudan Memory and the Hussein Shariffe project join with journalists, writers, activists, cultural and NGO practitioners, and political commentators, to explore in a public panel and open forum how our own and similar projects can sustain experiences and memories of shared cultures, and provide platforms from which to contest ongoing violence. The event begins with presentations from Sudan Memory and the Hussein Shariffe project, alongside a short film from the Sudanese Women’s Museum in Darfur. A round table with invited panellists is followed by open discussion. All participants are warmly invited to join us for a reception with light refreshments after the event.

Programme

Moderator Professor Erica Carter, KCL

17. 30: Welcome Dr Rosa Andujar, Co-Director, KCL Global Cultures Institute; Dr Charlotte Joy, Non-Executive Director, Heritage and Culture for the UK, UNESCO

Panel: Dr Sara Ibrahim Abdelgalil, Sudan Governance Programme Overseas; Dr Eiman Hussein, writer and psychotherapist, Metanoia Institute and FORWARD Foundation for Women’s Health Research and Development; Dr Charlotte Joy, UNESCO; Professor Emerita Marilyn Deegan, KCL Digital Humanities and Sudan Memory; Dr Kate Ashley, architect , KA-Studios and Sudan Memory Project Manager; other panellists tbc.

Followed by open discussion.

19.00 – 20.00: Reception

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